Drawing Challenge Posts 08-09

Hello!

Before I get started, I wanted to mention that I have FINALLY gotten around to reading Inheritance, the last book in the Inheritance Cycle by Christopher Paolini. I had read a review before getting it on my kindle, and I had expected to be disappointed, but I think the final book was actually very neat and recommend it to anyone who hasn't finished the cycle yet. There's definitely more action than there is in Brisngr, and the little bits of romance (I shamelessly say I ship Murtagh and Nasuada) are lovely. The review had said it wasn't as well written as the other books, but I think it was pretty well written. The shifting perspectives were a good change of pace, and really helped add insight into characters. That said, there are a few events in the book I felt were strange. The book does leave a few loose ends and questions unanswered, especially being the last book in a series, but unanswered questions are the wonders of books and stories and life itself.

This all goes to prove: Read books before reading reviews. Lesson Learned.

The 30 day challenge: It's been a few days since the last update, so I figured I ought to post something to here, even if I'm a bit behind in the actual challenge. hehe! :)

Day 8-- Favorite Animated Character

~45 min

So like I attempted to foreshadow in last

week's post, my favorite animated character is Zuko, from Avatar: the Last Airbender. Close behind is Toph Bei Fong, from the same show. :)

I didn't do very well in this drawing. >.< But...I'll do better...with practice? Maybe? I had tried to do something super-complicated in terms of pose, but that didn't go the way I planned hehe >.<

Anyways...About AtLA :) I watched all 3 seasons over a 4-day weekend, such was the awesomeness of it. I didn't completely love Zuko from the start of Book 1: Water. To be honest, I was pretty creeped out by his scar and , and by how ruthless he seemed initially. But after given the backstory to the scar, and seeing the more compassionate side of his character, I started to like this antagonist. As the seasons continued on, Zuko's character is developed and explained, and this radical character development was and is what enchants me the most.

At first I shipped Zutara (Zuko+ Katara), but about 3/4 of the way through Book 2: Earth, I decided that "Katara wasn't good enough for Zuko" for reasons I don't remember and probably don't agree with anymore. Of course, I'm still fine with it, as I am with Kataang (Katara+ Aang, the avatar), but my favorite pairings would remain Toko (Toph+ Zuko) or the canon Maiko (Mai + Zuko).

I don't really remember how I got started with Toko, but I distinctly remember that this painting by the lovely Charlie Bowater and the idea that Toph is the only one in the Gaang that didn't go on a "life changing adventure" with Zuko haha.

Day 9-- Favorite TV show

~1 hr 30 min

I felt like being fair, even though Avatar would probably count as my favorite TV show, so I drew something for W.I.T.C.H. Pictured would be Hay Lin in her New Power outfit and Eric Lyndon, her crush from....a lot of arcs ago.

Drawing wise, I felt like it took altogether too long to come up with this. Most of that was spent trying to make her outfit look decent and determine and angle for the scene. Ironically, my favorite part would be the water, which probably took all of 15 minutes.

About the show though, I felt it wasn't as wonderful as the comic, but more than good as a show of its own (but then again, when is the movie as magnificent as the book?). Evidently my favorite character is Hay Lin, but I also really likes Irma and later even Cornelia. :)

And...I might as well mention Winx, while I'm here. I liked WITCH a lot more: I don't remember any/ as many filler episodes, and the characters were more defined and developed, I feel.

Only two pictures this week, very sorry! But I ought to keep a buffer, and I'm still very behind :(. Also, I would like to note that the first two pictures can now be found in my deviantART as well! I just copy-pasted the text from this blog though, but if you wanted a full view/ zoomed version of any of these, they're over on dA! Please comment! There or here I'll see them both :) Thanks much!

Until the next post, Assalam Alaikum! ("Peace be with you" in Arabic.)

~Minerva

Drawing Challenge Posts 05-07

Hello again! :)

Another update with another handful of pictures! I hope to be caught up within a few days, but here's what I've got thus far!

I also noticed that the little images are not preview-thumbnails as I thought they were. Well then, I suppose i"ll just upload them in a larger size. The actual size of all of these is 6"x6", 180 pixels fer inch resolution.

Day 5--Best Friend

~2 hr 10 min.

I kinda cheated for this one. It said to draw our best friend, but I drew my twin instead. And I drew our avatars instead of our actual appearances. hehe :) But that doesn't change anything. <3 <3 <3

I'm actually really proud of this one. Maybe one day I'll go back and recolor the lines but for now I felt like it was fine the way it was. I know it doesn't look like 2 hours of solid, decent work, but... :X

I did like though, that the entire thing was done basically on 3 layers: lineart, color, and the light effect. And I've finally learned to use the opacity thing on photoshop to shade. >.< That's a good thing, I think.

Day 6--Favorite Book

~1 hr.

In case the 72+ size font at the bottom doesn't give a hint, my absolute favorite book is Ella Enchanted by Gail Carson Levine. The book generally follows the story of Cinderella, with a twist: the protagonist, Ella of Frell, is cursed with obedience.

I cheated on this one as well and colored vaguely over the movie poster. ( Except Anne Hathway is much prettier than I could ever draw.) I did change the costume and the bangs though, to match what I always envisioned. The eyes seem a little too far up for me (and NOT what I usually picture) but it was where they were on the movie poster....soo....o_O?.

Let me explain the green (trying not to give too many plot-spoilers, in case anyone reading this hasn't read the book (which they SHOULD) so this is going to be vague xP): One of the passages in the book that struck me is when Ella is dressing to go to a funeral and instead of donning another black dress, she puts on the dead person's favorite gown, which was a "grasshopper green".

The necklace in the movie didn't exactly sit well with me but I didn't embellish it as much as I would have liked to. Not a lot of things sat well with me about the movie, but that was because I was comparing it to the book...and as we all know, the movie is never going to be as epic as the book. To give them credit though, as a movie it's pretty fine.

Obviously I love other books as well. But I'll save that list for later. :)

Day 7--Favorite Movie

~1 hr 15 min

The scarves hopefully give it away. My favorite movie chosen for this project would be the renditions of Harry Potter by J.K. Rowling with the movies by Warner Bros.

Anyone want to guess who this ship is of? :)

Before I reveal who they were actually intended to be though, I would like to note that though I drew Harry Potter as part of the favorite movie entry, it was partially because I love the books more. So for the sake of being honest, I'm including a list of my other favorite movies here, in no particular order.

~Lord of the Rings

~Star Wars

~Pirates of the Caribbean.

~Rush Hour

~August Rush

~Anastasia

~The Last Mimzy

~Avatar

~Tangled

That's all the ones that I can remember off the top of my head, and I have small problems with some of them, but still like them a lot :) Of those, I was going to draw LoTR, but didn't know what to do. August Rush...I don't know what I would have drawn. Anastasia...really really tempting, but I didn't have a lot of time, and I didn't want to mess up her dress. And I can't draw boys very well. The Last Mimzy, again I don't know what I would do for. And I didn't draw Tangled because, well, you'll find out later :)

ANYWAYS! If you wanted to guess who this couple is, here's your last chance to guess......

Tis Rose and Scorpius :). I know they weren't exactly focused on in the book, but that was exactly why I chose them. It's not confirmed that Rose is in Gryffindor and Scorpius in Slytherin, but I was a Dramione as well as a Rosius fan (ironic, because they are mutually exclusive).

Drawing wise, I like how the scarves, Rose, and the glass came out :) Everything else, not so much. Like I said, I can't quite draw boys >.< Which sucks, as my favorite animated character is a boy. (ooo...mysterious foreshadowing! o_O)

Anyways, I think that's enough of a lengthy post for this week. Please comment/ critique/ suggest something/ mention a movie I might have forgotten/ emoticon-spam! Thanks for reading!

~Minerva

Drawing Challenge Posts 02-04

Hello!

I didn't purposely not update...I just have been drawing very late, much too late to be posting it right after. Thus, without further ado, here are three drawings! All at once :)

Day 2--Favorite Animal

~1 hr 15 min

I was trying to draw a pega

sus...I'm not quite sure how well I succeeded. It looks much better in this tiny preview than it does close up, meh. Not exactly what I imagined, but it's ok...for day 2.

I've always like pegasi. Horses that can fly= amazing. I'm not quite sure why, but I just seem to have always liked horses. They run, they jump, they're elegant and sleek and beautiful, an

d they have nice hay and heat smell. I've never really had horseback riding lessons though. As for the wings, I've always wanted to fly. Whenever I'm almost late to class (which is just about every class as I have a very bad habit of cutting to the minute before leaving for wherever I need to be) I imagine myself sprouting giant feathered wings from my back and soaring to class. Other times I summon a dragon or phoenix, or of course, a pegasus.

I remember in elementary school, I thought pegasus was the name of only Hercules's mount, and created the name "vier" for winged horses. One of my character then had a black vier with white socks and a white star called Midnight Stormwave. Hopefully I haven't done him any shame with this depiction.

Day 3--Favorite Food

~1 hr.

The food is a traditional chinese snack called Do4 Fu3 Gan1 (豆腐干) which in english translates roughly to "dried tofu" but I think should simply be translated as "the most awesome snack on the face of the planet". And of course, I had to add myself in there.

There are actually other versions of this, and in most dishes it's much thinner (think a vertical slice of what's pictured), and as much as I love xiang1 gan1 rou4 si1 (香干肉丝) (which is my favorite dish, but the challenge asked for a food, not a dish :x) I eat for the do gan, which means I prefer bigger chunks. :D

Day 4--Favorite Place

~30 min

The picture is not as wonderful as the place actually is, obviously. I was rushed though, which explains why it took about 30 minutes only (sitll, that's pretty crappy for half an hour. Time passes faster on the weekends though...so.. DX! Anyways, since the picture is obviously phooey, I hope to make it up with words.

The place is a courtyard in a hostel on the outskirts of Dublin, Ireland. I was 12 years old, part of a group of students that went to the British Isles for a fortnight. We were supposed to be resting before our next excursion, but I didn't like my roommates' music (or they were sleeping and I wanted to be noisy) or something like that and I ended up wandering outside into the hallway with a notebook, humming to myself. I couldn't call my parents because there was a long line of other guests.

I slipped outside to the the tiny courtyard, thinking I could write and hum in peace without bothering anyone there. The courtyard was roughly triangular, though my memory blurs and all I remember is that it was hemmed off by the walls of the three or four wings of the hostel. From one of the third-floor windows someone had hung a few shirts and pants. I picked my way over a few potted plants and onto the cobblestone, poking my sandals through the dust.

Just as I sat down on the broken little table, the rain started drizzling down. It was light, and just a sprinkle of water around me, and in a moment of delight, I stood up and spun around on the cobblestone, letting the light rain fall around me. I had been in a funny mood and put on the green shoes my mom bought me--they were only supposed to be worn with my formal dress--and as a few droplets of water fell on the rhinestone-pieces, the shoes glistened like crystal green slippers.

Simple, but very pure at that moment. I don't quite know if I have all the details right because it was quite a while ago, and I'm not sure I can express that emotion...yet.

Until next time!

~Minerva

Drawing Challenge 1: Yourself

Hi! :)

So I decided to improve my drawing skills on the tablet a bit this December 2011 and happened to find a "30 Day Drawing Challenge". I'm not sure where it originated, but this is my best clue thus far: Show and Tell.

The theme for the first day is "Yourself" so I attempted...myself. Not completely wonderful, and it completely lacks shading, but I'll be overly generous with myself and say that it's ok for my first bit of drawing in a long time. Hopefully I get better over the month. That's the point of this anyways.

~1 hr 30 min.

That's not the only reason I'm posting today though (good thing too, because my art isn't exactly anything to be excited about XP). I've been working on a story with a working title of "ECA" for a while now, that's based on a writing meme I found on deviantART. I'm about 68% done, so I figure I might as well start posting some entries--this weekend or next week? It's coming up though! :D

This week on Drawn in Words is a "Collab Fanfiction" which is really another way of saying I'm writing fanfiction for an incomplete work I'm writing -.-

Thanks for reading! Please comment! I'd love to hear any critiques/ suggestions/ rambles. :)

~Minerva

First Post!

First post! Yay!

This is going to be a cross between a writing blog and a personal blog.

If you haven't seen Drawn in Words, please check out that site too! I'm Silver Ink on that site, but I've decided to branch off a bit.

As of now, I will be continuing Drawn in Words, and I hope to posting a few of my own things on here. :)

But welcome (for new visitors) and thanks for staying with me (for those of that go "way back") and hope you enjoy the site! :)

~Minerva Wu

(formerly known as Silver Ink)